


a sound, a light that rips through the night

by WriterRose



Series: set a course [1]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Gen, Implied Kagami Taiga/Kuroko Tetsuya, Merman Kuroko Tetsuya
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-01
Updated: 2020-11-18
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:01:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26159218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WriterRose/pseuds/WriterRose
Summary: Kagami Taiga moves to the seaside town of Seirin where he learns that the old world isn't so old in Japan. His father talked endlessly of the sea when Taiga was little, yet now that he's grown, he realizes his dad never told him all there was to know.[Or, a modern fantasy AU with swashbuckling adventure, romance, magic, and bewitching mermen.]
Relationships: Kagami Taiga & Kuroko Tetsuya, Kagami Taiga/Kuroko Tetsuya
Series: set a course [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1899592
Comments: 4
Kudos: 11





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from the song "To The Sea" by Seafret.

As most cliched stories like his go, Taiga didn’t really want to move. Not entirely. He felt as though he had settled in America, found maybe not _his_ place in the world but _a_ place, which was a better lot than most people got in life.

His mom had found her place too. She was happy in LA and though that happiness came from her falling in love with someone other than his father, Taiga had long since gotten over his initial anger at his parents' split. Apart, they were happier than Taiga ever remembers seeing them together. 

However, he still felt pretty hurt whenever he thought about his mom. It was difficult sometimes for Taiga to view the divorce as her becoming happier and not view it as abandoning him and his dad, even though she had made it super clear that the latter wasn’t the case at all. She even expressed interest in being the one Taiga lived with when his dad announced he’d be going back to Japan. It was Taiga who picked living with his dad over her. 

He supposed the reason he did that was because even though he understands his mom’s motivations, he still sympathizes with his dad when it comes to their separation. His dad worked too much when it came to his job and hobbies alike, so it wasn’t only his mom to blame for their falling out. She did end up being the one to find somebody else though; the one to choose someone else to make her happy. In the end, that’s what won Taiga over, what made him choose his dad.

He needed a change of scenery, despite the fact that he loved Cali, loved who he became there; confident, happy Taiga, content to spend his days under the sun on the court. It took his falling out with Tatsuya and his parents’ split for him to realize that maybe Cali Taiga wasn’t actually all that happy, wasn’t actually content. So, when his dad planned to move back to Japan to take on the job he’s always dreamed of, Taiga decided to join him in his birth country. 

Though Taiga was presently having second thoughts, since his dad’s dreams entailed moving back to his sleepy seaside hometown and becoming the keeper of some tiny old lighthouse. Which made Taiga like, the lighthouse keeper’s _son._ Not a turn he ever thought his life would take. He’s sure he’d prefer to be Cali Taiga still.

It was no secret in their family that Taiga’s dad had been obsessed with Japan’s waters ever since he was a boy. It was once his goal to explore every nook and cranny, to discover all the secrets that the sea held...or so Taiga remembers his dad saying during story times growing up. 

However, though his lifelong goals involved the ocean, his dad instead pursued a more practical career when he started a family, even moved overseas and tied himself down to a cushiony desk job. _A necessary sacrifice, in order to feed that blackhole of a stomach of yours_ Dad had always teased, but Taiga could sense that he wasn’t entirely joking. Taiga even wondered if his dad giving up his dreams of the sea had built resentment between his parents? Maybe the divorce got his dad thinking there was no longer any need to sacrifice his own happiness for the sake of his wife and son? So, just as he was for his mother, Taiga was happy for his father, happy that he was doing something that made him happy.

But _good god,_ was Taiga’s life mundane now. 

His new house was barely that. It was a little two story cottage-looking thing with two floors, located next to the lighthouse, It had two bedrooms, a kitchen, one bathroom, and most surprisingly of all, WiFi, but it was still barely big enough for one person to live in comfortably, without going stir crazy since it was nearly completely secluded from the rest of the town. The vibe it gave off was creepy in nearly every sense of the word. With the smallest gust of wind it would creak and groan and moan. Taiga swore he was already hearing voices at night. Plus even in Cali the sea air had always been too much for Taiga’s sensitive sense of smell, let alone now when he’s living right freakin’ next to a bay or whatever. He’s had a headache nearly everyday. All in all, Taiga wouldn’t call it a place _anyone_ would like to call home, let alone a teenage boy. Let alone him.

Taiga had wanted a change, but maybe as always, he had thought too soon. Though that’s pretty ironic on its own, what’s perhaps even more so is the fact that Taiga is now tasked with watching the place on his own, which was what was presently causing Taiga’s sympathies to shift towards his mom. His dad claimed he had to take care of some unforeseen issues that arose with his departure from his old company. He assured Taiga that it wouldn’t take long, promising he’d be back within a month at the latest. He felt bad about leaving his son on his own so soon, but insisted that it couldn’t be helped. And Taiga believed him. 

Besides, it wasn’t like Taiga particularly minded being left on his own. He was a pretty independent guy in general. He just took issue with the place he was left.

Perhaps sleepy wasn’t the right word for Seirin Sound; comatose felt more fitting. It was once a bustling port city but had considerably calmed down in recent years, due to some sort of recession or something. Though it wasn’t a ghost town by any means. The only place on the whole sound that would be considered rundown would be Taiga’s new place of residence.

The lighthouse was removed from the rest of the town, located on the East-most point of the bay. It and the keeper’s quarters right next to it stood secluded on a sandy embankment, reachable only by the beach or (what felt like) the nearly half mile-long path connecting it to the main city streets, shrouded by tall beach grass, trees, and lined by cumbersome rocks; it was not an easy place to access. The only people Taiga has seen so far were those out on their boats or dedicated joggers who chose to run far enough along the beach. 

That was why Taiga was so thrown when he ended up receiving well-wishers three days after his move, a day after his dad had left.

There was a rapping at the front door to the cottage. When Taiga opened it, standing on his stoop were two people he’s never seen before. They fixed him with mildly startled looks, eyes fixed somewhere above him. Giving in to his curiosity - and his irrational fear that his new house was indeed haunted - Taiga turned around to see what they were looking at, but couldn’t find anything. When Taiga turned back around, the strangers only continued to look at the spot, mouths partly agape. 

“Can I help you.” he finally grunted, already not in the mood to indulge these random people who came to _his_ door and made him feel awkward for it. That finally seemed to break the strangers out of whatever daze they were in.

“Good morning!” greeted the scrap of a girl carrying some type of covered dish, to her credit, recovering rather quickly. “You must be Kagami Taiga-kun, right?”

“Yeah…?” he answered, eyeing her and the stern-faced boy standing next to her curiously. They were both young looking, probably around Taiga’s age.

“I’m Aida Riko and this is Hyuuga Junpei. We go to Seirin High.” the brown-haired girl, Aida, explained. “We’re here to welcome you to Seirin Sound!” she proclaimed as she held out the dish towards Taiga.

The dark-haired boy with glasses, Hyuuga, looked as though he in fact wished to be somewhere else. “We’re actually here to pick something up from your father.” he elaborated. 

“No need to jump straight to business, Hyuuga-kun.” Aida chided with a side-long glance at her companion, looking very much like she would have slapped him, had it not been for what she were carrying. “Here. Curry.” she instead explained, looking back to Taiga and once more pushing the covered dish through the air towards him. “Courtesy of Mitobe-kun and the rest of the Seirin High Sailing Club.”

Taiga finally took the dish from her but her statement drew his attention away from the offered meal. “Sailing Club?” he repeated, brows drawn in confusion. That was a thing here? He guessed it made sense for a coastal town, but it also probably dashed Taiga’s hopes of Seirin High having normal clubs, like some for sports, like basketball.

“That’s right!” Aida practically chirped. “Kagami-san messaged and said he put together some things that he found in storage that he thought we’d be interested in. Mind if we take a look?”

Taiga really didn’t have a good excuse to turn them away and he was desperately in need of some interaction with other people after spending so much time in this creepy place on his own, even with these strange visitors who were apparently never taught not to stare, so he agreed to show them inside and look for whatever it was they wanted. When he couldn’t find it in the house (and after putting the curry away) Taiga took them over to the lighthouse, using the massive ring of keys to unlock the door. Then he found what it was they were looking for.

His dad had left everything he decided to donate to the school club in a crate, helpfully marked with a post-it note that read _For Seirin,_ but it didn’t really clear up any of Taiga’s confusion. In fact, it only caused more.

Every item in the crate looked old, at least by a few decades. There was what looked to be weather-worn maps and journals, even little seashells and rocks and a healthy collection of sand lining the bottom of the crate. Though it were the journals that caused him the most confusion, when Taiga caught sight of what was written in them as Aida flipped through them, looking very much like someone who had found gold.

“These are amazing.” Aida near sighed, eyes practically alight in sheer joy. “So detailed and thorough…” she trailed, one hand to her chin in thought as the other continued to flip through the pages, eyes moving back and forth across the pages at a rapid pace.

Taiga couldn’t really make much sense of what the journals were about, exactly. The one he picked up and flipped through looked like it contained diagrams and detailed descriptions of lots of different normal sea-related things. Hand-drawn images of different types of knots that were useful on a boat, old fashioned ships, seashells… But then there were more confusing drawings and descriptions of places Taiga’s never heard of, etchings of carvings or jewelry or something, and most surprisingly of all...

“Mermaids?” Taiga said, though it probably came out more like a scoff. His reading comprehension of Japanese had probably deteriorated over the years, but he could still make out that _a lot_ of these pages were about mermaids. The writer dedicated lots of entries to them, describing their favorite places to live, their habits, their appearance, all kinds of things in such detail that it seemed almost as if the person who wrote all this down thought they were real.

“Isn’t it incredible?” Aida answered, not sensing Taiga’s judgement. “I’ve never seen such detailed reports before. Your father sure is dedicated.”

And then Taiga was promptly blindsided. “My father?!” he repeated, looking back to the journal in his hands with a new sense of horror. _Dear god,_ his dad made all these? Made all these drawings and wrote all these descriptions? That couldn’t be true but, but it _was._ The cogs in Taiga’s brain finally started turning and recognized his father’s handwriting and drawing style. It was the same hand that doodled on his lunch when he paper bagged it growing up.

The volume and detail of the books would be impressive if Taiga wasn’t so thrown by the fact that so many entries were, once again, _about mermaids._ And there were even entries for other creatures that he’s never heard of before, but knew for a fact _definitely_ didn’t exist. His dad loved old myths and stories, sure, especially those pertaining to the sea, but to go to these lengths was a bit extreme…

Was his dad delusional? Was this why his parents split? But no, these journals were old, written before Taiga was even born probably. And his dad was giving them away, so it wasn’t like he was attached to them or anything. But even still, the fact that he did all this was alarming. It must have taken him hours. Hell, probably days or months, even.

“Yes, your father. Who else?” Aida answered back, looking a little judgmental of Taiga’s explosive reaction. 

“Why?” Taiga found himself saying, unable to say anything else as the offending pages refused to leave his line of sight.

“To document his findings and travels, I suppose.” Aida shrugged, now looking as though she were questioning Taiga’s mental state. “It’s what any good explorer would do. What I make my boys do.” she informed with a sidelong look to one said boy next to her. 

To his credit, Hyuuga only startled momentarily, as if Aida making such a statement brought up a sense of dread within him. “You’ve never seen these?” he instead asked of Taiga, taking the book that Aida had in front of her and handing it over to Taiga.

Taiga switched journals with him, quickly rifling through the new pages and finding much of the same content, with perhaps even more focus on things that seemed insane, like curses and magic and even more mermaids. “No. Never.” 

Aida hummed as she returned to the crate, riffling through what was left. “Strange. Though my dad can also be eerily mum with the details when it comes to talking about his time spent at sea.”

That statement only caused Taiga somehow even more confusion. “What club did you guys say you were from again?”

“The Sailing Club.” Hyuuga answered as Aida continued her riffling, without looking to Taiga as he stacked whatever his companion found interesting enough to take back with them. 

“Is that popular here?” he asked. He’s heard of similar clubs in the US, them being fairly popular in the west and east coast alike. He didn’t know much about sailing in general, seeing as it never really ever interested him much. Surfing was the only water sport he tried and didn’t immediately give up after the first time. Though even with the limited knowledge he had of sailing, Taiga knew that whatever _all this_ was in the crate wasn’t really what you’d considered part of the sport.

“Well, we’re only in our second year of running it here at Seirin, but we hold our own against the others pretty well.” Aida informed. 

“Others?” Taiga repeated back once more. He was starting to sound like a damn parrot. “Sailing is popular in Japan? Like all of Japan?”

“The coastal cities, at least.” Hyuuga answered, brows furrowed as both he and Aida looked away from their tasks and to Taiga with confused looks of their it own. They shared a look between each other before looking back to Taiga again. “Where is it that you’re from again?”

“Los Angeles.”

“America?” Aida said before she gave a soft chuckle. “No wonder you’re confused. Japan’s a little _old world_ when it comes to sailing clubs. It’s probably not even what you think it is.” she furthered with a smirk, as if she found her own comment and Taiga’s lack of knowledge rather amusing. “It’s not yachting or racing sailboats or anything like that. You’ve probably seen it better represented in the movies.”

“Movies?” Taiga was just very lost now.

“Hm, you’re really having a hard time with this, let’s see, how to word it…” Aida mused, as though to herself. She snapped her fingers and grinned. “Think of it less as sailing and more like swashbuckling.”

_“Exploring.”_ Hyuuga corrected, eyeing his companion’s zealous look with clear weariness.

Taiga was absolutely floored. “You guys are _pirates_? They have _pirates_ in Japan?” 

“You’ve only confused him more, Riko.” Hyuuga huffed at Aida, as if chiding her for causing him more problems. “I don’t think he’s ever heard any of this before.”

Aida sighed. “I’ll start from the beginning then. But the abridged version.” she all but warned.

And so, Taiga was given some startling information;

What some places would consider old myths and legends were still very much alive and believed in, in Japan, Aida explained. The myths and stories may have contained fantasy creatures, but they often rung with truth - and treasure. So much so in fact that a lot of these stories lead to many people actually finding treasures that were once though lost to history, with rather startling frequency, in Taiga’s opinion. These seemingly once-in-a-lifetime findings happened so frequently that _high schools_ even had _clubs_ that allowed students to play pirate and find treasures of their own, to receive a bit of the reward but to mostly give their school bragging rights. Apparently, it was the world’s best kept secret, since Taiga’s never heard a damn word about it in his life.

“I really can’t believe you’ve never heard any of this, considering who your father is and all.” Hyuuga said once he and Aida were done with their little history lesson. Aida has long since gone back to looking through the journals, flipping through the one she hadn’t read yet.

“And just who exactly do you think my dad is?” Taiga asked, eyeing the crate and wondering if even he really knew the answer to that question.

“Kagami Kaito? Renowned as one of the greatest seafarers in Japan?” Hyuuga supplied, fixing Taiga with a look that suggested he found the fact that he even had to say it quite strange. “He’s struck more gold during expeditions than anyone else.”

“And he means that both literally and figuratively.” Aida helpfully clarified. “His research has led to more discoveries than anyone else has managed to. He’s found lots of treasure, sure, but it’s his treasure trove of knowledge that’s really impressive. At least to me.”

“You really don’t know any of this, do you?” Hyuuga asked as he watched Taiga, his expression suggesting he knew the answer. 

“No.” Taiga answered honestly, feeling rather stumped as to why. “I know he likes the ocean. I guess I now know why… But he never told me all...this. Not in a serious way, anyway.” he finished, loudly shutting the journal in his hands closed, as if putting the information out of sight would cast it out of his mind.

“Well, that’s a shame.” Aida sighed once more as she closed the journal in her hand and returned it to the crate. “I was hoping to get some information out of you.”

“Like what?”

Aida shrugged before she pulled something new out of the crate, a tiny box no bigger than Taiga’s fist. “Why he suddenly gave up the life?” she answered, inspecting the box in her hand curiously, something clicking against the sides as she turned it this way and that. “One day, he just disappeared. Donated all his things to different organizations and private charters and just left the field entirely. Everyone assumed it was to start a family. I always thought there was something more to it, but I guess not. This is strange.” she then said, tone abruptly changed. 

Her attention was focused solely on the box, so the other teens looked to it as well for an answer to the purpose of her remark.

_“Black Child.”_ Hyuuga read, the words written across the bottom of the box in a messy scrawl, in what looked like permanent marker.

Aida turned it around again and tried to open it up, but the box was locked, apparently, not budging one bit. She eyed the keyhole on the front of it before she turned to Taiga. “Do you have the key?” 

“No. Never seen that before in my life.” Taiga answered. 

“You don’t know much, do you, kid?” Aida remarked rhetorically as she looked to the crate once more, moving aside some papers in search of a possible key. When her search turned up empty, she simply returned the locked box back to the crate and placed all the journals back inside. 

“No worries.” Aida sighed for the final time as she stood back up from where she was resting on the floor. “If there was one to be found, your father would’ve given it to us, I’m sure. Besides, it shouldn’t be too hard to crack open.”

“He also wouldn’t have given us the box at all if it was something that interesting.” Hyuuga added as he too stood up. 

“True true…” Aida tutted before she turned to Taiga once more and gave a polite bow. “Well, Kagami-kun. It was nice to meet you. Thanks for your hospitality. And do send our thanks to your father once again.”

“Sure…” Taiga trailed, though he was pretty confident that when he saw his dad again, passing along Aida’s thanks would be the last thing on his mind. 

Pretty soon after, Aida and Hyuuga collected their new belongings and took their leave, Taiga sympathizing with the other male as he started in the arduous journey back to the main road, burdened by the crate. But he was only minorly sympathetic. His mind was sort of processing a lot, after all.

Before they hit the tall grasses and passed from Taiga’s sight, Aida turned back to face the lighthouse, “Though you don’t seem to know that much, you’re of course welcomed to join the Sailing Club. We’re always in the market for new crew!” she called, accompanied by a wink and everything.

The moment she made the offer, Taiga knew he wasn’t going to take it. He thought they were kind of insane and sailing seemed like a stupid waste of time. His mother had instilled in him some manners though, so he at least knew better than to straight up say that. Instead, he waved back awkwardly, his face unable to pull an expression better than a grimace. When the visitors finally disappeared past the greenery, even that flat expression fell. 

Taiga shut the door and decided he was rather fine with being stuck here alone if that’s what the locals were like; absolutely batshit crazy. Apparently, just like his dad.

Taiga sighed and wiped a hand across his face. What a strange place he’s ended up in.

* * *

The next few days were a grueling cycle of taking care of the lighthouse and the cottage, going to school, and trying not to lose his mind as he lived in more solitude than he’s ever been in all his life. And live with the fact that his dad may in fact have had a secret life based on the insane notion that there were magical creatures out there in the ocean. 

Taiga had texted his dad, told him that some kids from Seirin High had stopped by to pick up some of his old things, but instead of taking the bait and telling Taiga more about it, he just thanked him for taking care of it. Of course, Taiga couldn’t get himself to just come right out and say that the things Seirin had said about him - not to mention the journals he had made himself - all seemed super crazy to Taiga. So it all went left unsaid and Taiga dwelled on his questions as he continued living in a monotonous cycle. 

The walk to the main road was annoying more than it was tiring and there wasn’t much he needed to do in terms of taking care of the lighthouse since it was pretty much automated. So he sort of just, hung around the beach and the cottage all day. When he wasn’t at school. 

He received a lot of looks at school - because he was a new kid, because he was an American returnee, because he was tall, because of his hair, probably - but no one bothered to talk to him. He’s been told all his life that he has a rather intimidating aura and he’s never really seen that as a bad thing. Until now.

Taiga had never felt so alone, not even after his falling out with Tatsuya. There was no one for him at school to talk to, obviously. The Sailing Club seemed to be under the impression that he was as looney as they thought his dad was, so he’d been avoiding them like the plague. His conversations with his mom had halted past her initial inquiries into how his new school was (though to be fair, Taiga’s responses were dry and vapid at best). And he hadn’t heard from his dad for a while either, which wasn’t much of a surprise, but it was really annoying, especially when Taiga really wanted to talk to him.

His dad had never been one for open communication when it came to sharing explicit details of his past, Taiga realized. Mom claimed it was because it was sometimes too painful for him to even think about, let alone speak of. She assured him it wasn’t anything too bad, but Taiga had never figured out what it was. Dad loved talking about his youth spent at sea, but he obviously left out some pretty major details. Taiga wondered what else he might have left out. He also wondered what he was doing that was keeping him away for so long.

His dad’s absence only caused Taiga to dwell on the man’s less favorable qualities; his inability to share details, for starters. Or his inability to balance work, life, and family. _‘Work stuff’_ shouldn’t really be thrown around as an excuse as much as it was by his dad, but it was. He said he’d only be gone for a short while and Taiga’s solitude would only be temporary, but after some thought, Taiga remembers he’s heard it all before. 

Maybe he had made a mistake following his father and coming here to Japan, not choosing to stay with his mom and Alex? Sure, it’d be a bit weird, but it had to be better than this, this suffocating, repetitive solitude?

Though as awful as his days were, it were the nights that were truly awful for Taiga. As he lay in bed, the sound of the waves crashing against the rocks a few yards away and the wind howling as it jetted into the lighthouse were more of a mockery than a comfort. The symphony of noises and the weight of his emotions kept him up till nearly sun up sometimes. 

It was so frustrating. So _annoying._ Taiga was so _tired,_ tired of _everything._ But most defeating and utterly humiliating of all, Taiga was so, so _lonely…_

It was only after he felt tears rolling along the side of his face and hitting the mattress below did Taiga’s brain register that something was wrong. Not with his life, per say, but with his thoughts. He usually never felt so defeated by life, never pathetically pitied himself as much as he was now. Hell, he can’t remember the last time he’s _cried._ It wasn’t during his parents split, he knew. Not even after Tatsuya. Something was wrong.

He sat up and looked around his dark room in confusion, scrubbing away his tears and willing the urge to keep wallowing in his own misery to go away. At some point during his pity party, his heart had begun racing, so he tried calming it down. He sat and listened to the sounds he so loathed for something to focus on. 

And that’s when he heard it.

He’d missed it at first, mistaking it for the wind hitting the shingles, but the more Taiga focused on it, the more distinct it became. It was a low droning. Though that wasn’t entirely right because it wasn’t really a flat, singular sound. It kept changing, as if it were...melodious, or something. Like a hum.

He felt more tears trailing down his chin and his confusion and frustration grew, which kept his emotions from tittering over the edge too much. It also kept his panic at bay, because Taiga had realized with harrowing clarity that the hum wasn’t the wind at all. It was an entirely separate sound.

He yanked the sheet from off of his legs and swung them over the side of his bed, standing up before he stood stark still. His heart was racing again and this time he was able to figure out why that was - because of his panic - but it didn’t really comfort him any. He stood and listened again, trying to figure out where the hum originated from. He closed his eyes, ignoring their sting again as he focused. The sound was slightly louder in one ear. He turned his head that way and the opposite to confirm it. His initial thought was right. His head turned back to where the sound was strongest and he opened his eyes. He saw the window.

He forced his feet to walk over to it and pressed his ear to the side, to a crack where he felt a slight draft as the air passed through. The sound was still low, but louder than it was anywhere else in the room. It was coming from outside.

Before he knew it, Taiga’s feet were outside on the cold stone platform that the house and lighthouse rested on before he silently jumped down into the sand below, the sand somehow colder than the stone. But that didn’t matter. Taiga's own lonely sorrow didn’t matter either. All that mattered was his panic, because he finally figured out what the sound was. It was a _voice._

He suppressed his fear the same way he was suppressing his strange anxious sadness, by focusing on his confusion and frustration and following the hum. Though it wasn’t entirely a hum. He could hear a syllable or two of a word if he really focused. His panic was waning but worry was building. Who the hell was out here this time of night? Where were they?

He couldn’t see anyone along the beach, only the light of the houses on the far end, past the dunes. The voice was also definitely straight ahead of him, which meant it was coming from the water. He might not have grown up here, but he knew it wasn’t smart to take a swim in the dark. That’s when most drownings occurred, his brain recalled from somewhere. And the wind was pretty wild tonight, causing some rougher waves. Yep, definitely no one should be swimming.

When Taiga finally reached the water’s edge, he kept off the wet sand. He wasn’t quit dumb enough to go wading into the water in search of the singer. Besides, he didn’t have to search anymore, because he could see the person. Only it wasn’t a person at all. Because they had a _tail._

They… _It_ was floating on its back, uncaring of the waves that crashed over its face - a sensation that would send any normal person spluttering. The...The _creature_ didn’t even move when that happened. It just flicked it’s tail, a fin - _an actual, real fin_ \- breaching the surface and sending the creature back to a comfortable distance, away from the shore. Hell, the thing was so unbothered by the waves that the wordless humming song continued to softly pass through it’s lips and into the air, slamming into Taiga with an uncomfortable force that caused his heart to stutter and his unbidden tears to start flowing again and to feel like he was the only poor creature left in the world. 

_He was alone on this beach, in this town. He was abandoned by his mom and in turn he abandoned her. His dad abandoned him and Taiga was going to abandon him too once they had their talk and he learned all the secrets his father had kept from him. It was awful. Taiga was awful, horrible, so very awful. He just wanted to sink to the floor and never get up again. It’s what he deserved. He was so awful—_

But no he wasn’t. Taiga didn’t think any of those things. Or rather, he didn’t _believe_ them. He didn’t feel this way. He was Taiga freakin’ Kagami, for cryin’ out loud. Nothing bothered him. He didn’t feel this way. _These weren’t his feelings..._

Having had enough, Taiga did the only thing he could think to do in that moment. He dropped to the ground, furiously blinking the tears out of his eyes as he searched the rocky sand for _something._ After a moment, he found what he was looking for. Even in the dark he could see it; a medium sized stone with a large ridge passing through it, making it look like two rocks had somehow fused together. It was heavy enough to not be knocked back by the wind but light enough to soar through the air. It was perfect. 

So Taiga righted himself and threw the stone, right at the humming creature in the water.

He must have overcompensated for the wind, because the rock Taiga threw absolutely pelted the thing as it floated. Taiga even heard a fleshy smack before the stone _plunk’d_ into the water below.

The creature startled and the sound finally stopped, something in Taiga sagging with relief. But then the creature righted itself in the waves flawlessly, almost looking as if it were standing, but Taiga knew the water was too deep to do that where the creature was. It’s pale back was now to Taiga as it clutched at the spot that had been hit; what would be a shoulder on anyone else, had it not been on a creature with a tail. Taiga’s bright idea then suddenly seemed not so bright.

“Ouch.” Taiga heard a soft, flat voice say. The relief that had flooded him at the stopping of the debilitating humming sound was then swiftly replaced with straight-up panic as the creature then turned in the water and looked straight to Taiga, expression blank, with skin impossibly pale and eyes impossibly blue. 

“Hello.” it said in the same, calm (emotionless) tone, voice low but carried by the wind, soft and (falsely) soothing, as if it had floated along through the air and nestled (un)comfortably within Taiga’s ears.

Taiga then promptly turned heel and ran back to the cottage and slammed the door shut behind him, heart not even calming when he locked the door and pressed his back against it.

What the hell was _that?_

What the hell was his life? 

Maybe Taiga was the one that was crazy.


	2. Chapter 2

That night was the worst night’s sleep Taiga’s ever had. Not just since the move, but in his entire life. He’s slept longer on planes, for pity’s sake. He got in maybe 30 minutes - tops. Not long enough to dream, so he couldn’t chock up his strange, insane memories of last night as one, sadly. That didn’t mean that he still didn’t try to, though.

As soon as it was an acceptable hour to be up - and it was plenty bright out - Taiga went back down to the water, to the same spot he was last night. He didn’t know what he was looking for, exactly. A sign that it was just a dream would be nice, but exactly what that would be or look like was lost on him. 

Until he spotted it; a clear sign that someone had been here after him, to the secluded beach, in the exact spot he was standing last night.

The sand there had all been pushed aside, flattened and smoothed as best it could be. On the ‘cleared’ surface, in some sort of design, there were lots of tiny shells and pebbles lined out in a spiral. The six lines met in the middle and led straight to one single stone, resting in what looked to be an upturned clam shell. In an instant, Taiga was dropping to the ground and inspecting the rock, turning it in his hands and running his fingers along it’s simultaneously rough and smooth surface. Touching it only confirmed what he had already suspected; it was the rock Taiga had thrown at the creature last night. Like literally the exact same rock.

He looked around past the water’s edge, eyes scanning the surface as if he’d spot something out of the ordinary, perhaps the creature again. Though Taiga didn’t really know if he even wanted to see it again. On one hand, seeing it again would confirm he wasn’t, in fact, crazy. On the other, it would only give him more questions and concerns. None of which he could have answered.

Or maybe not. Maybe he _could_ get them answered? Only, he worried what it’d do to his pride and dignity to do so. Looking back at the stone though and the complicated design in the sand, made of shells and pebbles that couldn’t have been arranged by any creature without hands, Taiga realized his pride and dignity were a necessary sacrifice. 

Half an idea formed, Taiga stood up and pocketed the stone and headed back to the house. He had school in an hour. Not to mention a dish to clean.

* * *

Taiga would say he was getting sick of being stared at whenever he met someone new, but it wasn’t like he wasn’t used to it by now.

“Sorry. What exactly is it that you want?” inquired the small brunette that had answered the Sailing Club room door, wearing a crooked and curious smile on his face as he stared up at somewhere above Taiga, like everybody else always did.

Just as he asked this, two others came up behind the smaller brunette, a tall guy - though not quite as tall as Taiga - with droopy eyes and a stoic look and another brunette, only slightly taller than the first, squinting at Taiga critically. 

“I...came to return this.” Taiga merely said, presenting the cleaned dish that once held curry, his voice taking on the awkward cadence it did whenever he was feeling particularly nervous.

That seemed to do the trick though, as the tiny brunette somehow perked up more after he finally looked down to see what Taiga was carrying. “Oh! It’s your dish, Mitobe!” he practically yipped, turning to the tall dark haired kid on his right. 

Droopy-eyed - Mitobe - gave the smallest of smiles as the fact seemed to register with him too. He then silently shuffled forward and took the dish back from Taiga and gave a curt nod, as if in thanks.

“How was it? Mitobe’s super good at cooking, his curry especially.” continued the eager-faced kid, who kinda reminded Taiga of a cat, for some reason. “He’s also used to making way too big of portions because he feeds all his siblings at home and the rest of the club when we’re out on the ship, so sorry that you probably had leftovers for days.” he quickly prattled on, hesitance to speak to Taiga apparently gone.

“Uh, no. It was fine. Thanks.” Taiga just grunted out, as terrible at being polite as ever. He had actually eaten all the food in one sitting that first night and had just left the dish sitting around the house for about a week and a half, unable to make himself go and return it. Until now, now that he had a reason to fraternize with these people who seemed less and less crazy each new day he spent in this town, since these were apparently the experts to help solve Taiga’s problems. Oh, what his life had come to.

“Sorry, who is this?” squinty-eyed kid then asked, looking down to cat-boy for an answer, who didn’t seem to have one. 

Though then Mitobe nodded again, this one with barely any discernible movement, which was why Taiga was so surprised when cat-boy not only noticed it from over his shoulder, but was able to figure out exactly what the larger boy meant by it. “Oh, wait, that’s right, you must be Kagami!” he seemed to recall. 

“Oh, yeah.” squinty-eyed chimed in, a friendly smile finally gracing his face. “The new lighthouse keeper’s son.”

Taiga grimaced. It was one thing for him to refer to himself as that, but to hear it actually said by somebody else only cemented Taiga’s new reality. It left a slightly bitter taste in his mouth, to say the least. Though he bit back whatever barked remark that he wanted to voice in irritation, because he had something that he came here to do after all. “Yeah.” he instead said.

“Nice to meet you! Welcome to Seirin!” cat-boy grinned. “I’m Koganei and this is Mitobe and Tsuchida. We’re part of the crew of the Seirin Siren!” he grandly proclaimed, putting his hands on his hips and everything.

Mitobe remained unfazed but Tsuchida at least had the decency to look minorly embarrassed over such a statement. “You don’t have to announce that to everyone that comes by, Koga...” he trailed.

“The Seirin Siren?” Taiga repeated back, this visit already turning out better than he thought it would, if that last word was what he thought it was.

“Our ship name.” Tsuchida clarified.

“Ah. So not an actual siren...” Taiga mumbled, disappointment actually leaking into his voice, the matching feeling quickly followed by shame when he processed what words had just come out of his mouth.

Koganei laughed. “No. If we did actually have a siren though, believe me, the whole country would know. The world, even.” he joked.

Taiga then perked up again, because, “You say that like they’re actually real?”

The three other teens in front of him then paused for a moment, sharing a look - similar to the one that Aida and Hyuuga shared the time they spoke to Taiga all those days ago - before looking back to him. They seemed to be deciding something. What, Taiga didn’t know.

“Well, that just depends on the person.” Tsuchida then vaguely answered. “Whether they’re real or not, I mean.” he shrugged.

Well that made absolutely zero sense. You couldn’t just _decide_ if something was real or not from person to person. If something was real, it was actually, physically real. What the hell were these people trying to say? Were they trying to mess with him? Confuse him? Throw him off?

Instead of voicing any of this however, Taiga figured using a lot less hostility than he wanted to would go a long way. So instead, he resisted the urge to shuffle his feet as he worked up the nerve to ask his next question, without risking sounding like a moron. _(High risk,_ an inner voice that sounded suspiciously like Tatsuya’s jabbed). “What about you? Do you guys think they’re real?”

The three teens shared a look once more, quicker than the last but Taiga was able to discern it this time. _How much should we tell him,_ they were wordlessly asking each other. 

“We’ve never actually seen one. None of our club mates have either.” Tsuchida finally disclosed, once again not actually answering the question.

“Except for one.” Koganei supplied. 

“That’s right.” Tsuchida answered quickly, as if he had forgotten the fact himself - or wished to skirt the subject. “But...I don’t know. I’d say I do. Believe, that is. I’ve seen some pretty incredible things since joining this club. Ningyo wouldn’t be too much of a surprise at this point.”

“Ningyo?” Taiga repeated back. He was quickly learning the only way to have a conversation with these people was to just have them elaborate on everything they said.

“Ningyo, sirens, merfolk...it's all the same. Ningyo is what they call themselves.” Tsuchida explained as Mitobe silently left the doorway, Koganei watching him do so curiously but staying rooted to his spot. “Allegedly.” Tsuchida added belatedly, as though he almost forgot to cover his own tracks. 

Taiga found these three just as weird as he had found Aida and Hyuuga. They stated their own beliefs rather readily but when it came to providing facts - which they seemed to have - they were oddly unforthcoming.

Mitobe then returned, dish gone but a new, familiar object in his hands.

“Oh, good idea, Mitobe.” Koganei praised when he saw the journal in his hand, one of the ones Taiga had given Aida and Hyuuga a few days ago. One of the ones his dad wrote. “These are from a trusted source.” he elaborated as Mitobe handed the journal over to Taiga and he took it, staring at the name on the cover with a mildly queasy feeling.

“My father.” Taiga near croaked. 

“That’s right!” Koganei answered, unaware of Taiga’s discomfort. 

There was a pause then, as Taiga opened the book and stared at the contents with a clear frown on his face.

Then, “Mitobe says you look like you have some specific questions but are probably a little embarrassed to ask?” Koganei somehow translated, breaking the silence. Taiga looked up to them again. “Everything we know is in these books, so if you feel like there’s something you can’t ask us, just look it up in there.” 

“That’s right.” Tsuchida finally spoke up with another kind smile, as if to comfort Taiga. “These used to belong to your dad, after all, so feel free to come by anytime to look through them again. We only ask that you keep them in the club room so the Commissioner doesn’t come after our throats for ‘losing’ them.”

That would be helpful, Taiga had to begrudgingly admit, but that would mean he’d have to spend more time in this place and with these people that just...just weirded him out. 

“Why…” Taiga started before he cleared his throat and tried again. “How could they exist and no one knows about them?” he posed, purposefully not outrightly denying or accepting the offer, instead choosing to bring the topic back to what he thought was most relevant.

“Well, I wouldn’t say _no one_ knows about them.” Tsuchida said, crossing his arms and looking off at something, contemplative.

“They’re said to be shy.” Koganei reasoned, not thrown off by the topic change, apparently.

“More like frightened…” Tsuchida trailed with a rather sympathetic look on his face. Impressive levels of pity for a creature that ‘allegedly’ existed, Taiga mused. “As you can imagine, they’re pretty sought after. Most people you meet out on the water don’t _just_ want to see one. They want to _own_ one. So I don’t blame them for being skittish. The last official sighting was years ago, now...”

Making a mental note to look up that ‘official’ sighting later, Taiga instead focused on something else that the other teen had said; 

If mermaids or merpeople or whatever they were called were supposedly so skittish, why didn’t the one that Taiga saw last night run and hide - or rather, swim and hide - the moment it spotted Taiga watching it? Why did it leave Taiga something to _find_ in the morning, to _prove_ that it was there?

As Taiga contemplated his answerless questions, he flipped through the pages of the journal, hoping to find something that would elaborate on any of them further than these helpful yet hesitant people in front of him were able to. After about a minute or so of quickfire skimming, he found an entry that looked sort of promising. 

Taiga looked up at his apparent audience, who were still watching him with clear curiosity. “Mind...if I read this now…?” he requested, eyes flicking to one of the empty tables inside the club room. 

The other three teens promptly stepped aside as they still openly stared. It was Tsuchida who held out his arm in a welcoming manner. “Help yourself.” he said, clear intrigue over what Taiga was doing written all over his face, but it went politely left unvoiced. And Taiga was grateful for it. 

He nodded as he ducked inside and sat down at a random table, hunching over in the seat as he started to read over what he’d found, doing his best to ignore the curious looks he got from the three other teenagers as they in turn tried to go back to whatever it was they were doing before the strange, awkward teen showed up asking nonsensical questions. Nonsensical to literally anybody else, anyway.

* * *

Singing was apparently a talent that all mermaids possessed, according to his dad’s journals. An unfortunate (or fortunate, depending how you looked at it) side effect was that whoever happened to be in range to hear the song would also feel whatever way the mermaid wanted the listener to feel. The tune or melody or whatever could literally put people in a trance. A mermaid could send someone into a watery grave just by singing to them, and the person would just throw themselves into the sea and be none the wiser.

But that was just one way to look at it, his dad had argued in the journal. That was an extreme case. Usually, siren songs weren’t sung with malicious intent. Usually, their singing just made the listeners feel whatever emotion the siren wanted them to feel. Which was still disturbing, but better than the alternative, Taiga guessed...

Though now that he had this information, Taiga didn’t really know what to do with it. It was comforting to know that the creature he saw last night wasn’t trying to drown him, but that didn’t answer the question as to why it was singing to him in the first place, not to mention choosing to make him feel the way he did. 

No doubt about it, the singing he heard last night made Taiga feel lonely. Or rather, it just amplified his insecurities to the point where he was overwhelmed by them. 

Why would the creature want to do something like that? Was it trying to lure him out of the house? Though that wasn’t right either… When he first heard the sound, Taiga had wanted to just lay in bed and wallow. It was his own stubborn curiosity that got him up and out of his bed and to the shore to figure out what the call was. Like the proverbial cat, he supposed.

And like the curious cat, Taiga probably had a bit of a death wish, so he found himself back in that same spot on the shore the very same night he spoke to the guys from Seirin. Say what you want about Taiga, but at least he faced his problems head on - _(on some occasions,_ argued a voice that somehow sounded like his mom, dad, and Tatsuya combined). A mermaid was apparently one such occasion his stubborn will deemed worthy of an effort.

Unlike last night, everything was silent on the shore. The wind had even calmed down some, so the waves were tame and there was no howling white noise he needed to block out. Though there was nothing to be heard anyway. There was no humming and most obviously, there was no tailed human floating on its back in the water. For all Taiga knew, the creature could have already hightailed it out of here, now that it knew Taiga knew it was here - no pun intended. 

But that didn’t seem right. The Seirin guys had said mermaids were skittish. The one Taiga had met the other night _wasn’t,_ since it had said _hello._ And - embarrassingly - Taiga was the one to flee once he saw the creature, not the other way around. Plus, it left him that little present just this morning. So, something told Taiga the creature was still here, lurking around somewhere. 

Though all of his previously mentioned observations would’ve been enough reason for anyone to draw a similar, logical conclusion, what really had Taiga convinced was something he called instinct. He felt not on edge, but alert, the hairs on the back of his neck standing at attention, and not just due to the cool breeze. 

Something was here with him, near. 

Taiga reached into his pocket and pulled out the same stone he had thrown last night, the same one the creature had returned to him this morning. If this didn’t work, he thought as he looked down to the rock in his palm, nothing else would.

Taiga then threw the stone, about the same distance he had last night, adjusting for the lack of wind. It plopped into the water and sunk far out of sight. 

And then he waited. If nothing came of this, Taiga decided as he shoved his hands in his pockets, he would forget all this ever happened and go back to the mundane cycle he called life. Something mundane would be a comfort at this point.

The water was still, not even the waves able to disturb it’s surface for long tonight. 

Until, suddenly, nearly soundlessly, Taiga saw a head of light blue hair breach the water. The strands were sticking to a pale forehead and partially obscuring a set of piercing eyes - he could see _the eyes_ in the dark; they looked inhuman, not just for their color but for the way they almost seemed to absorb any light that hit them. The creature remained partially obscured by the water, only surfacing up to its nose. _Why would a mermaid need a nose, though? Could they even breathe through it? What about gills?_

The creature then lifted its face the rest of the way out of the water, as though it recognized Taiga and in doing so, deemed him unthreatening. 

“Hello again.” it greeted in the same even tone Taiga remembered from last night. It jutted out of the water to its boney shoulders, its face set in the definition of a neutral expression as they stared each other down.

Then, it unexpectedly threw something right at Taiga, its arm moving almost in slow motion before it flicked its wrist effortlessly in a show of clear ease. With his reflexes, it was easy for Taiga to catch, yet he was still surprised by the creature’s accuracy, in the near pitch dark. 

He looked down to his palm. Of course, it was the stone again. He scowled.

“What’re you doing here?” Taiga asked, eyes narrowing in suspicion as he looked away from the now-wet stone and back to the creature.

“I could ask you the same thing.” the creature merely responded, expression still flat and tone still as emotionless as it was last night. It paused, as though it had finished speaking, but then continued, “But same as you, I suspect.”

“Same?” Taiga scoffed. 

“I live here.” the creature elaborated. “I assume you’re the new caretaker of the lighthouse.”

“We’re not the same. My dad pays rent.” Taiga frowned, which was a stupid thing to be arguing with something that literally lived in the sea. He continued anyway. “You, on the other hand, are trespassing.” 

“I don’t know much about the intricacies of human property ownership, but I don’t think this area falls under your father's jurisdiction.” the creature argued right back, fanning its arms out in a more pronounced way as it treaded the water, as if to indicate the area. It brought its arms back to its side, so low in the water and close to its body that Taiga shouldn’t have been able to see them any longer, had they not been so damn pale. His skin looked nearly aglow when engulfed by the dark waters.

“I disturbed you last night.” the creature began again after another short pause, in which it only continued to stare unwaveringly at Taiga. “I apologize.”

“What were you trying to do? Drown me?” Taiga asked a bit hostilely, even though he had already ruled that out by himself. He supposed he just wanted to see what the thing had to say for itself.

“No. I was only musing aloud. Honestly, I didn’t know you heard me.” it confessed, looking away to the water, the first break in their eye contact. Then, it’s pale blue eyes returned to Taiga, as if it had noticed something. “Actually, I didn’t think anyone would have been able to hear me. I’m not very loud.”

And wasn’t that the truth. If Taiga didn’t know himself so well, he definitely would have mistaken the ‘song’ as the wind and the troubled feelings and thoughts as his own.

Instead of saying all this however, Taiga crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I’ve got sharp senses.” he said, tilting his head to look down upon the creature from his nose.

“Is that so.” the creature answered, tone not lilting at the end with a question, as it would for anyone else who said such a thing. The creature then soundlessly moved through the water, towards the breakers that jutted out from the beach. All in one movement that looked as though it was well practiced, the creature then pulled itself up onto one of the rocks and continued to stare at Taiga. Though Taiga was doing his fair share of staring himself. 

He could see most of the lower half of the creature now, a better look than he had last night. It’s upper half was mostly normal, though it’s neck was definitely sporting some gills. The majority of it’s torso was a milky white, though there seemed to be a smattering of shiny patches of skin that glimmered oddly when they caught the moonlight, and Taiga’s keen eyes were able to tell that it wasn’t just beads of water playing tricks on him. They seemed to be patches of scales, looking like freckles almost, varied in size and spacing. Though the further his eyes traveled down the creature’s torso, the more dense the patches of scales became until they seemed to come together to form the tail, shades of light blue and white combining to make up one ghostly color pallet.

The creature scooted back on the rock a bit more, seemingly making itself more comfortable. The end of its tail flicked out of the water for a moment, the tailfin looking as though it were actually translucent, like a jellyfish. 

It took Taiga a moment to realize the creature was looking back up at him. It had noticed his staring. “I take it I’m the first of my kind you’ve ever seen.” it once again stated, instead of asked.

Refusing to be unnerved by this thing any longer, Taiga approached the breakers and maneuvered his way out onto the rocks. He eventually found a surface that looked safe enough to stop on and did, though he chose to remain standing. He was still a fair distance away from the creature, but closer than he’s ever been to it yet. “And I take it I’m not the first human you’ve ever met?”

“No, you’re not.” it simply confirmed. It then looked past Taiga for a moment, where he knew the lighthouse to be. It paused, as if debating something before it turned back to Taiga. “I used to talk with the previous tenant.” it clarified. “Their son, at least.”

Taiga knew squat about the previous tenants. He was under the impression that the lighthouse sat vacant for a number of years before his dad decided to take it on. The creature could be telling the truth, or it could just as easily be lying. So Taiga figured it wouldn’t hurt to probe a bit more. “Is that why you aren’t running away? Er - fleeing? I thought all mermaids were supposed to hate humans.”

“Firstly, I’m not a mermaid. I’m a ningyo.” it started, actual, slight indignance leaking into its tone, more emotion than Taiga’s ever heard it express. “Secondly, I don’t make it a habit to fear humans needlessly. I’m not afraid of them, so long as their intentions are pure.”

“And how do you know if that’s the case?”

“I have sharp senses.” it evenly answered, leveled gaze telling Taiga that it was indeed throwing his own words right back at him. “I can just tell. You’re different.” it seemed to shrug, the movement so minuscule that Taiga had barely caught it.

_What the hell did that even mean,_ Taiga wanted to ask, though he knew better than to think he’d get a straight answer. “Well, I’m really not. Find some place else to haunt with your sad-ass songs.” he instead shooed, waving his hand at the creature and everything.

“I already told you that that was an accident, you hearing me.” the creature seemed to sigh before it steeled itself again. “And no. I was here first.” it all but pouted. 

“There’s really nowhere else for you to go? You have literally a whole ocean.” Taiga argued. Really, he didn’t need the thing hanging around his house all the time. Adjusting to his new life was hard enough. He didn’t want to also have to deal with one of his father’s secrets, in the scaly flesh, haunting him. 

“That’s some flawed logic.” the creature noted. “But I couldn’t leave even if I wanted to.”

“Oh? And why’s that?”

The creature turned to face the open waters then, pointing at something in the distance. “Do your sharp senses see those boats over there, ningen-kun?” 

Ignoring the stupid nickname for now, Taiga looked to where the creature was pointing. Sure enough, there were boats traversing the water, at the mouth of the Sound. But, “So what? They’re always there.” he pointed out. “They’re just fishermen or whatever.”

“They’re Hantaa. Hunters.” the creature clarified as it turned back to Taiga, but avoided eye contact this time. “They seem to know I’m here. I’m good at hiding from them, but I’m slow. If I make a break for it now, they’d most certainly catch me.” 

“Hunters?” Taiga repeated back, looking away from the boats and back down to the creature that actually, genuinely looked troubled. “What do they want with you?”

“I do not wish to find out.” the creature said, turning from Taiga once more, looking down at its tailfin below the water.

Remembering the looks of the others he had met that day, the clear sympathy in their voices as they spoke to Taiga of the weird fishpeople, of their anger when they spoke of the people who wished to _own_ a ningyo, he started to feel as though he understood, but he still of course had some doubts. “But not every human is bad in your book?”

The creature turned back to him. “No.” it said, expression looking just a bit softer. “I’ve been very fortunate to have only come across kind ningen so far.”

Taiga assumed that included him. He looked away, feeling oddly embarrassed. “You don’t even know me.”

“No. But as I said, I can tell. You’re different.” it reiterated. “Which is why I must humbly ask of you a favor, ningen-kun.” it began as it turned on the rock so that it was completely facing towards Taiga. It then literally _bowed_ to him, bending at its waist as best it could. “Please allow me to remain in these waters for the time being.”

Taiga was taken aback and thusly found himself answering before he really even knew it. “W-What? No. I mean, you— You can’t keep bothering me like this! I got a normal life I’m trying to live!” he practically barked. 

The creature looked up at him. “You will not even know I’m here.”

Taiga seriously doubted that. “...No more songs?” he instead asked.

“As I said, that was an accident and a lapse in judgment on my part. It won’t be happening again.” it assured.

Taiga sighed. He may not have wanted any trouble for himself, but he couldn’t for some reason let himself potentially send the thing to its doom by making it leave. At least not until he learned more about what the deal was with these Hunter people… “Then I suppose it’s fine… For now.” he finally consented.

The thing righted itself and then actually smiled at him. It was tiny as hell and barely there, but there was a definite upwards turning of it’s lips. “Thank you very much, ningen-kun.” it thanked with another one of it’s bows. 

“E-Enough of that. Kagami is fine. Kagami Taiga.”

The creature righted itself again. “Kagami-kun it is then.”

Taiga raised a brow, brain finally catching onto something. “You use honorifics? Even mer—ningyo?” he corrected. 

“I do.” it - he, it definitely looked like a he - informed. “I learned a lot about humans from the boy who lived here before you. Your speech patterns and terms of address in particular appealed to me.”

Taiga supposed humanizing this thing, this merperson, would make it easier for Taiga to deal with it’s - _his_ \- existence. By doing that, Taiga could pretend that he was just another quirky inhabitant of this backwards town and everything was normal. Yeah, yeah, sure. That would work. 

He sighed. “Then what do I call you?”

The siren raised his head to Taiga ever so slightly then, as if in greeting. “I’m Kuroko.” he said before it gave one final bow. “Please take care of me.”

Okay, this guy was definitely human enough for Taiga to pretend everything was normal. Almost _too_ human. Or rather, too Japanese. It just used freakin’ _keigo_ on him again… The thought then occurred to him then, that of course not even a mermaid in Taiga’s life would be seminormal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It would really mean a lot if you could comment/review if you enjoyed the fic/chapter. :)


	3. Chapter 3

In hindsight, Taiga maybe could have learned a thing or two about proper Japanese manners from the merboy because the next day after classes had ended, the American-returnee marched straight to the Sailing Club club room and promptly asked, “What are Hunters?” in lieu of offering a proper, respectful greeting.

Unfortunately instead of the kind upperclassmen he had met yesterday, there were different individuals in the room this time around. One of whom Taiga didn’t recognize. One he did. 

“Haaah?” Hyuuga seemed to straight up _growl,_ annoyance and offense plain to see on his face. 

_Oh shit,_ Taiga mentally startled. That was a shitty way to enter a room of people he assumed were all his seniors. He didn’t remember spotting any of them at orientation and it wasn’t a very big school. And was Hyuuga a hardass? Taiga didn’t get that impression the first time they met, the guy seemed almost demure then. Though maybe Aida’s presence had something to do with that? Just Taiga’s luck, the girl was nowhere to be seen now.

Though maybe he didn’t have all bad luck, because right as Taiga choked on whatever word garbage was about to fall out of his mouth next, someone popped up behind him. 

“Hm?” he hummed in question. Taiga turned slightly and was somewhat relieved to recognize cat-face, Koganei, from yesterday. “Oh, it’s you again, Kagami~.” he greeted cheerfully, voice taking on a sing-song like cadence. 

“Kagami?” parroted the figure in the room that Taiga did not know. He turned his eyes on Taiga, gaze piercing as he sized up the newbie, look unwavering. Then he smiled. “Ah, the infamous Kagami-kun. The lighthouse keeper of our lives.” he said, as though he were reciting a line in a play or something. He was met with a moment of silence - because Taiga certainly didn’t know what to say to _that,_ nothing polite, anyway - and apparently neither did any of the others. The dark haired teen then turned to his silent fellow club members. “Get it? Like ‘light of my life’ but—”

“Izuki, shut up.” Hyuuga grunted without even looking at the other, eyes fixed on Taiga. “What is it that you wanted?” he asked, and though there was a touch of annoyance in his tone, he didn’t seem as angry as Taiga initially feared, not at Taiga anymore, at least.

That didn’t mean Taiga should continue being reckless however, so he tried to choose his next words carefully. Though before he could come up with an elegant response, he felt someone lightly grab his shoulder. He turned again to see that it was the silent senior from yesterday, Mitobe, offering a small, friendly smile and silent support.

“We sorta gave Kagami permission to look through the journals whenever he wanted.” Koganei explained to his club mates, as though they were Mitobe’s own words he had somehow translated. “We thought it was only fair, considering his dad wrote them and all.”

Hyuuga raised an eyebrow. “And you didn’t somehow think it’d be wise to consult your Captain on this decision...?” he trailed, voice dripping with a promised threat if he didn't like the answer.

Koganei, to his credit, looked only minorly concerned. “Well, it was Tsucchi’s idea—” he began before Mitobe gave him _a look_ and he amended, “—but we all agreed to it. But we said he can only look at them in the club room!”

Hyuuga sighed and looked off somewhere, as if thinking something over. Or dreading something, rather. “Well, then it’s fine, I guess… But you three can be the ones to explain that to the Commissioner!”

 _That_ seemed to alarm Koganei, more than the threat of his Captain apparently, if the startled noise he let out was any indication.

“Why do you want to know about Hunters?” Izuki asked, surprising Taiga and his other club members as he seemed to be the only one who recalled Taiga’s initial question. 

All eyes then turned to Taiga, as if they had indeed been reminded, and their looks seemed oddly suspicious of him. 

Oh great, put on the spot… Why didn’t Taiga just flip through the journals for the information himself?

...Because his reading comprehension was still pretty shit, he immediately answered himself. He could have at least _tried_ to read them again but with the addition of school work, his attention span was admittedly waning fast and it had turned him rather lazy… It was only fair that Taiga paid for that laziness now.

“I...think they’re hanging around the lighthouse.” Taiga had quickly lied, impressing himself some. What was it that Alex always said when helping him and Tatsuya get out of trouble? _The best lies aren’t really lies._ “They’ve been circling the area. I asked someone what they were and they said they were Hunters. Is that some more weird Sailing Club sh—stuff.” he quickly amended.

At this bit of information, the club members all looked strangely worried, before then looking between each other, like they had some sort of secret that Taiga wasn’t in on. (Well, he had his own fair share of secrets, he supposed).

Then, suddenly, Taiga felt himself pushed the rest of the way into the room. He looked at Koganei in surprise, kinda impressed the pipsqueak was able to move him. Mitobe then wordlessly slid the club room door shut, the air about them now turning rather ominous.

“Stay away from those people, Kagami.” Koganei warned, an actual frown on his face, the first Taiga had seen him bare. 

“What? Why?” Taiga asked, a little thrown off as he looked around the room and noticed that everyone sported similar dark looks. “They’re only after ningyo… Right?”

“Hunters is a sort of general term. Ningyo hunters, treasure hunters…” Izuki listed off with a sharp, intense look in his eyes. “But more accurately—”

“They’re thieves.” Hyuuga finished for him, voice leaking vitriol. He then stood from his seat and crossed the room until he was standing right in front of Taiga, making for a rather intimidating figure despite his shorter height. He leaned into Taiga space, as if about to start laying into him. Though instead he asked, “They haven’t tried speaking to you, have they?” 

“What? No.” Taiga quickly assured, noting all the harsh looks the other teens were giving. Even Mitobe looked angry. “They’ve just been like, stalking the area.”

“Good.” Hyuuga said in a breath, not relieved, but it seemed to have freed him of some sort of tension. He then clasped Taiga on the shoulder and looked him dead in the eye behind his glasses’ oval frames. “Don’t ever speak to them.” he ordered. 

“Why would I?”

“Why indeed?” Izuki said, still seated, but his hands now folded in front of himself as he rested his chin on them. “They must have some reason for hanging around the lighthouse. Maybe you really are infamous…” he mused, as if to himself. 

Taiga’s brows furrowed. “Hah?”

“They might know who your father is.” Hyuuga elaborated, sounding as though Izuki had cleared that up for him as well. 

“Ohhh...” Koganei breathed out, a worried look on his face, a matching one to be found on Mitobe’s.

“It’s possible they think his presence at the lighthouse means something interesting is to be found nearby.” Izuki concluded.

How right they were...both Seirin and those Hunters. No way Taiga blames Kuroko now. He really was stuck; at the lighthouse and with Taiga. 

He almost showed the realization on his face, but he quickly reigned it in. Hopefully, soon enough that the sharp eyed teen didn’t notice.

“Is there?” Izuki asked, drawing Taiga from his thoughts, Taiga’s attempt apparently unsuccessful. At his feigned confused look, the other teen clarified, “Something interesting to be found, I mean.”

 _The best lies aren’t really lies,_ sounded in Taiga’s head once again, and so he quickly came up with, “My dad didn’t really tell me much about all...this.”

Hyuuga hummed, believing it since he was one of the firsts to break the news of his father’s reputation to him. He turned away, seeming troubled by something still, but whatever it was, he left it unvoiced.

“Well, in any case,” Koganei began as he gave Taiga’s back what he guessed to be a comforting pat. “just be careful. If they try anything that makes you nervous, you can always come to us. Right, everybody?”

They all readily agreed with different levels of enthusiasm, but the same level of conviction and though Taiga wordlessly questioned how’d they’d be able to help, he just agreed for the sake of getting out of there.

Yep, they were definitely all upperclassmen, he realized. Good ones at that, if their assurances could be guaranteed. Though Taiga was concerned as to why they’d even have to make any in the first place and what exactly these Hunters wanted...

* * *

As much as Taiga liked to complain about falling into a continuous cycle, that’s exactly what he ended up doing with the siren that lived near his new house. He tried to excuse it as paranoia over the ships that still traveled back and forth across the Sound, argued to himself and the siren that he was just keeping an eye on the boats when he came out each evening to spend a few hours with the blue-eyed, blue-haired being. But he - and he suspected the merguy at this point - knew that Taiga really just wanted to know more about his strange new neighbor.

And Taiga means strange in every sense of the word. Kuroko was odd, not just in the sense that he was literally from a different world than Taiga, but in his mannerisms and personality. And once again, not just because he was part fish. 

For the most part, Taiga did all the talking during their interactions, mainly him being the one asking questions and Kuroko always answering him, yes, but his responses were typically vague. He never really went into details. He was uber polite, more Japanese than any Japanese person Taiga’s met on land in that sense. He was quiet and seemingly contemplative, not minding whenever Taiga’s questions would cease and long silences would stretch on. Kuroko merely sat on his rock on the breakers, looking to the starry sky and bright moon or the lights of the houses that lined the shores on either side of the Sound. Or he’d cautiously watch the boats whenever they popped into the Sound, both those of regular fishermen and Hunters alike, but he never did any talking that was unprompted. Hell, he never made a sound that was unprompted.

True to his word, Taiga never heard Kuroko sing or hum again and while he was glad for it, Taiga strangely found himself longing for it. He had no idea if it was just a lasting side effect of the siren song or what, but there was a part of him that still longed to hear it, to hear the pure emotion that made that song so captivating in the first place. To hear the siren convey a feeling other than deaf content, if that’s what you’d even call Kuroko’s normal disposition. However, Kuroko stayed ever mute, apparently not minding sitting in absolute silence with a stranger.

That’s why Taiga had taken to doing his homework while sitting out in the near dark with the siren. There was enough light from the moon and the lighthouse and Taiga’s vision was well enough that he didn’t really have to strain his eyes, so he figured he might as well try and pretend he was a student when he and Kuroko just sat in their silence. Anytime he tried to do his homework inside, he’d find his thoughts drifting to the siren or the Hunters, wondering what either were doing. So suffice to say, no work would ever get done. So Taiga just decided to cut out the middleman and do his schoolwork while he sat on a nearby rock outside, being careful not to drop anything into the water below. 

It was almost peaceful, the sound of the waves, wind, and seabirds making for one perfect soundscape. Probably the perfect recipe for total relaxed concentration, had Taiga been literally anybody else.

The homework for English class was easy enough. He wasn’t an expert on all the intricate rules of grammar, but his years spent in America allowed him to easily fill in the blanks on his own and more often than not come up with the correct answers. Math was easy to a lesser extent. It was never Taiga’s strong suit - no subject was, really - but math never changed no matter what country you were in, so it was one of the subjects he at least stayed consistent in, with Ds and Cs, which says a lot about how well he does in his other classes…

Japanese was of course his worst subject. One, he didn’t have much of an attention span and two, as stated many times previously, his reading comprehension in Japanese was pretty shit - about the level of a first year middle schooler, since that was around when he first moved. He glowered at his assigned reading for Classic Japanese Literature and tried not to deliberately throw the book into the ocean. The work sheet remained blank, of course, sans his name scrawled messily at the top.

“Are you struggling with something?” Taiga then heard a calm voice say, breaking the long silence, nearly causing him to drop his book in pure surprise. Kuroko had somehow worked his way closer to Taiga, laying flat on his stomach in the sandy shallows of the water, arms folded atop the rock next to his, to keep him rooted to the spot against the waves that tried to push and pull him.

For someone that seemed like he should be at least a little weighed down by his meaty looking tail, Kuroko moved very silently, his actions matching his demeanour and cadence. Taiga didn’t hear his approach at all, which made no sense, because shouldn’t he have heard the water splashing around as he moved against it?

See, this is what he meant. Kuroko was strange.

“I lived abroad until a few years ago, so I’m bad at reading Japanese.” Taiga found himself explaining, for some reason. He didn’t really owe the siren an explanation or anything, but he reasoned he’d rather make small talk than try and fail to resume his work.

“Would you like me to help?” Kuroko politely offered.

“Thanks, but I—” Taiga automatically began before he promptly cut himself off when something finally registered with his brain. “Wait a second. You can _read?”_

“Yes.” Kuroko answered, as if it was the most obvious thing. “And write, though to a lesser extent.” he furthered, tracing his finger along the rock he held onto, as if writing out characters. 

Huh, his hands looked weird, Taiga just then noticed. The sparse patches of blue and white scales on Kuroko’s skin got more and more dense in his hands until it ended at the webbed fingers. The webbing, like his tailfin, looked translucent, so Taiga almost didn’t notice it at all. Especially when he focused on the siren’s fingers, which ended in short, rounded claws that were a dark black, stark compared to the rest of his practically porcelain skin. That same color effect - an off-balance mix of light and dark - was furthered by the black cord wrapped many times around one of his wrists, made of some type of leather-like material, the only ‘clothing’ he wore. Again, weird.

 _“Life of an Amorous Man.”_ Kuroko read from the cover of the book, drawing Taiga’s attention back to the conversation. “A rather scandalous read, but a classic.”

“No way. How?” Taiga deadpanned, sounding as skeptical as he did blown away. Kuroko not only read the cover, but knew the _plot?_

“The boy who lived here before you taught me.” Kuroko explained, a somewhat far off look on his face. He nodded his head in the direction of Taiga’s reading assignment. “That book happened to be one of the ones he found lying around in the house when I asked him for some more reading material.”

Pushing past the slight shame that came with the knowledge that a marine creature had a higher reading level than he did, Taiga instead furthered the conversation, since he usually didn’t get much out of the tight-lipped merman. “You read? Like, for fun, I mean.”

“I used to.” Kuroko seemed to shrug, the movement once again barely discernible, but Taiga was getting better at picking up on them. “Once he moved, my book supply ran out, seeing as I didn’t exactly have a place to store them. That was years ago now.” he finished, voice not quite trailing off in thought, but the closest to it that Kuroko ever got, Taiga’s learned.

“Well, apparently, you’re still good at it…” Taiga trailed, looking to the cover and once again, feeling rather impressed. It had taken him close to a minute to read the cover without misinterpreting it the first time he tried. Biting back his embarrassment, he begrudgingly sighed, “I admit, I’m impressed.”

Kuroko stared unwavering at Taiga then for a moment, much to Taiga’s confusion. Taiga just stared right back though, never one to back down from a challenge. 

That seemed to decide something for Kuroko then, because he closed his eyes and bobbed his head ever so slightly before he fully pulled himself out of the water and up onto the rock next to Taiga’s, sitting himself down as neatly as he could with a massive tail in the way. “Thank you. But I read light novels mostly, as they were far easier to understand. It was a struggle to read that book the first time, but I powered through, as they say, since at the time, I was sort of desperate for anything to read at all, really.” he divulged and Taiga almost held his breath through it all, because he had never heard the siren say so much before and feared the sound would cover up the other’s already quiet voice.

Sensing this could be an olive branch of sorts, Taiga handed the book over to Kuroko, which he deftly accepted, Taiga once again staring at the siren’s odd though strangely captivating hands as they brushed against his in the exchange. They were cold, as Taiga had somewhat expected, but not slimy or anything like he originally thought they’d be. They felt rather smooth, almost soft. “Do you...think you could help me with this, then?” Taiga asked, picking up the binder he had attached his worksheet to as a rest.

Kuroko stared at the book for a moment, silent as his eyes darted across the open page. Taiga wondered if the siren even registered that he was thumbing the other pages, a black nail making a soft _thwipping_ sound against the paper as he did so. “I will do my best.” he finally agreed after a moment of clear hesitance.

Taiga couldn’t help the small smile that crossed his face at that moment. He had made some substantial progress after all with getting the siren to speak to him for this long, not to mention be this close to him. And maybe, just maybe, Taiga’s already abysmal grades would get a little boost in the process.

* * *

They spent a lot of time together like that from then on, with Taiga attempting to do his homework and Kuroko helping when he could. Taiga even went so far as to rent a few books from the school library for the siren to read on his own. Not as a favor or anything, just because it was way too awkward to sit in their long silences when Taiga did his non-Japanese literature homework and Kuroko sat there, just looking around at nothing.

To entertain the siren, Taiga picked up a few light novels, titles that Kuroko remembered or different works by the same authors. The siren had a strange taste in reading material apparently, because every title Taiga picked out for him looked either really confusing and philosophical or just plain depressing. Though Taiga couldn’t really be one to talk, however, since he found some strange reading material of his own.

He wasn’t really searching for anything like it, per se, but it did catch his eye. Much to his surprise - though he should really stop being so surprised at this point - he had found a few books on ningyo that look really official and everything. _‘Pod Structures and Dynamics of Ningyo’_ and _‘Ningyo Migration Patterns and Territories’_ were the two titles, written by two completely different people, to boot. If anything, Taiga figured these books could at least serve as conversation starters for him and Kuroko. Plus, this was a way he could avoid the Sailing Club and his own existential crisis, by seeking sources that weren’t his dad’s journals. 

Of course, he should have known better.

At first, the short, timid looking guy behind the school library’s checkout counter seemed rather unphased by all of Taiga’s rentals. He didn’t try to make small talk about any of the titles either, like the other library committee members had tried and failed to do when they checked him out, unaware of the fact that the books actually weren’t for Taiga. 

No, it was all going rather well until this new guy got a look at the books Taiga had checked out for himself, the ones on ningyo. His neutral expression changed. He looked surprised and somewhat intrigued - not judgemental, which was a bit of a shock - but smartly kept any comments to himself. That is, until he saw Taiga’s student ID.

“Kagami Taiga.” he read, looking at Taiga’s ID, to Taiga, and back to the ID again, as if he couldn’t believe it. “No way, really?”

Taiga glowered, at this point quite tired of his reputation getting ahead of him. “That’s what it says, right?” 

The guy startled and Taiga just couldn’t find it in himself to feel bad about it. “Oh, yes, ‘course, it’s just, you’re the ningyo guy.” the other continued in his defense, which _did not_ do him any favors.

 _Ningyo guy_ was way worse than the lighthouse keeper’s son, Taiga instantly decided. And worst of all, the guy didn’t know how true it was… Or, maybe he did, Taiga then thought with sudden clarity. What if this guy somehow knew about Kuroko…?

Taiga _glared,_ forehead almost hurting with how tight his brows were drawn in suspicion. “What did you just call me?”

The poor guy behind the counter then looked as though he were about to faint. Had Taiga not suspected him of stalking him, he’d feel sorry for him. 

“Uh, that is—U-Um, I mean—S-S-Sorry, I meant to say—I, uh.” the guy stuttered, the whites around his beady eyes somehow getting even wider with his panic. “You’re...You go to the Sailing Club. You visit it, not that you're in it! I am. In the Sailing Club, that is. M-My seniors have mentioned you.” he finally managed to get out, all but cowering away.

At this reveal, Taiga eased his harsh look a bit. “Is that right?” he asked, doing his best to keep his tone blasè. Of course he was a Sailing Club member. These guys were everywhere, it felt like (though it certainly didn’t help that Taiga kept going over there of his own accord)… What exactly were they saying about Taiga when he wasn’t around?

“T-T-That’s right!” the guy stuttered out again. “You donated some things to the club. And you didn’t think ningyo were real.”

“Didn’t?” Taiga parroted, raising a brow. As in past tense?

“Well, you keep coming by, they say. To read more about them.” the nervous student elaborated. “You’re at least questioning their existence, then… B-But that’s just what I’m assuming!”

Seeing as no one was around them, Taiga leaned in close to the guy, resting against the checkout counter. Unlike the seniors of the Sailing Club, Taiga suspected he might actually be able to worm some more concrete answers out of this nervous guy through the age old art of intimidation. “And what about you?”

The shorter student blinked exactly once. “What about me?”

Taiga resisted the urge to roll his eyes. “Do you think they’re real? Ningyo.”

The guy looked away then, apparently also cautious of anyone who could potentially be listening in. Much to Taiga’s delight however, he didn’t seem to have any reservations with eventually sharing, “Everyone has their own reasons for being in the Sailing Club, but if there’s one thing we all agree on, it’s that there’s definitely got to be something out there.”

“And that something has to be fishpeople?”

The guy’s brows furrowed, not in worry this time, but in thought. “Well, yes and no. I mean, just think of all the evidence! The photos, the treasures, the fact that Hunters are a thing…” he trailed, looking as disturbed at his own mentioning of the mysterious group as Taiga himself felt. “Most people around here believe they exist. They’re just wrong in thinking that their population is a lot smaller than it actually is.”

At that, Taiga looked down to one of his books, the one specifically about population and whatnot. Well, it was time he got some things sorted out, then. 

With one last look and grunted goodbye to the guy behind the counter, Taiga collected all his rentals and made his exit, with more information not just in his hands but in his head.

The Sailing Club was talking about him amongst themselves and Taiga wasn’t naive enough to think that it was all conversational or innocent. His instincts flared at the thought, only confirming that the vibe he’d been feeling during his last few visits was correct; the Sailing Club was keeping tabs on him. To what end though, Taiga could only guess.

* * *

“I didn’t take you as an extra curricular reader.” Kuroko commented as he eyed the two stacked books Taiga had kept for himself when he handed over the light novel he had rented for the siren.

“I’m not. You should know that as well as my teachers at this point.” Taiga scoffed as he watched the merman settle into his place besides Taiga, a small, happy-adjacent smile on his face as he looked to his new book, courtesy of Taiga (Kuroko’s expressions were never outright, after all). In the nights they’ve spent together, Taiga’s gotten rather good at understanding the siren a bit more than he ever thought he’d be comfortable with, and judging by his proximity, Taiga guessed Kuroko felt the same way about him. Which is why he figured it was time he started asking for some more concrete answers to his questions. “Have you ever heard of Sailing Clubs?”

“Yes.” Kuroko confirmed with a nod, still engrossed in reading the back cover of the rental. 

“What about Seirin?” Taiga furthered, before a thought occurred to him. “...What about Kagami Kaito?”

Kuroko carefully placed the book down on a free rock next to him, no doubt sensing Taiga wanted to have a deeper conversation tonight and not just their usual small talk. “Seirin is the name of this town. As for Kagami Kaito, I don’t know them. Besides the fact they share a family name with you. Are they a relative of yours?”

Taiga looked away, trying to keep the disappointment off of his face. He figured it’d be a bust, after all. “Yes. He’s my dad. Apparently, he has a reputation for being like a renowned sailor or something and did a bunch of research on your kind.”

Kuroko inclined his head ever so slightly, as if to say ‘go on’.

“I didn’t know all this until a few weeks ago.” Taiga continued. Was that really how long it’s been already? Damn. “He donated some of his stuff to the Seirin Sailing Club, some journals. I’ve been trying to read them when I can, to learn more about him. And you, I guess. I figured I’d cross-reference some other sources to try and see how his answers compare.” he explained, flipping through one of the books he had begun reading, the one about population. This was something that had long been on his mind. 

“The stuff he wrote about ningyo, it’s less...harsh on you.” he continued. “Other actually published writers say some pretty negative stuff. Like how you’re conniving and against humans, how you're sexual deviants and treasure hoarders, how you want to drown us and kill us… My dad doesn’t say that kind of stuff though. If anything I...I think he defends you, almost.”

Kuroko was silent as Taiga spoke, of course, though he wore an admittedly guarded expression as Taiga went on. He was clearly frowning. Not just the neutral frown he always wore, but a frown that showed clear distaste and...remorse? Taiga wasn’t sure. Kuroko was hard to read.

“Do you have any of these journals?” Kuroko eventually asked. 

Taiga shook his head. “I can’t bring them outside of the club room.” he explained as he dug in his pocket and proceeded to pull out his phone. “But I took a few pictures on the D-L.” he informed as he handed over his phone to Kuroko. “Uh, don’t drop it. It’s far less water-proof than any book. Swipe your finger against the screen to change the picture.”

“I know what a phone is, Kagami-kun.” Kuroko said flatly as he took said device from Taiga and proceeded to read the text captured on screen.

Taiga rolled his eyes. “Of course you do.”

They sat in quiet for a few minutes as Kuroko deftly read all the pages Taiga managed to get a picture of. He finished surprisingly fast, though there were only a couple photos, seeing as Taiga was never alone when he went into that club room. He wondered if that was on purpose, on Seirin’s part. 

Taiga returned his attention to the present when Kuroko lowered the phone. There was a curious expression on his face as he handed it back to Taiga, but once again, Taiga couldn’t exactly place the emotion.

“His information is startlingly accurate.” Kuroko confirmed. “And not just in an objective sense.”

At this, Taiga recalled something that Aida had said when he met her, about how his dad’s writing was interesting because it was so detailed. He didn’t really like how it only created more questions for him. “The Seirin Sailing Club seems to share the same thoughts as my dad about you guys, from what I can tell. But for some reason, I still get a strange vibe from them.”

Kuroko looked to him, as though he were actually already considering Taiga’s feelings as valid before even knowing the full reasoning behind them. “How do you mean?”

Taiga gave a frown of his own as he thought on it. “Like there’s something they’re not telling me. And like they’re keeping tabs on me.”

Kuroko looked all around them for a moment, to the shore and to the deeper water ahead of them. “Well, I’m not sure of their intentions, but they’re not here now. You don't need to worry.”

Taiga looked confused as he turned to look at their surroundings, just seeing mostly darkness. “You can tell?”

“I spent my childhood in a trench. The Black Trench, to be specific.” Kuroko informed as he reached into the water below and splashed some onto his tail and rubbed some into his arms (this was to keep himself from drying out, Taiga had learned). “There’s not much in the way of natural light down there, so I can see quite well in the dark. Better than most others of my kind, in fact.”

That struck a familiar chord with Taiga somehow. He thought of not only the rock he had thrown at the siren the first night they met - the one that Kuroko was somehow able to find, on the ocean floor, and return to Taiga - but something he had read as well. He went to his phone and searched through his photos for what he was looking for. He found it, though Kuroko beat him to it.

“Yes. It’s one of the kingdoms your father writes about.” Kuroko confirmed. “Though ‘kingdom’ is a funny choice of words. More of a colony, I’d say.”

Taiga couldn’t even manage a response to that, too engrossed by his own whirlwind thoughts as he reread the entry on his phone. 

_‘Hailing from the Black Trench, the Kuro seldom ever leave their home, as they’re much more comfortable in the dark waters of their birth than anywhere else in the sea. Due to this, there’s really no information on their dynamics with ningyo of other origins or of their characteristics in general. When they do leave their home waters, they’re near impossible to spot as they have an ability to camouflage unlike any other of their kind.’_

‘Kuro.’ That must’ve been how Kuroko got his name? How did naming work for ningyo anyway? Did they even have given names? More importantly, if Kuroko specifically was from a...species or whatever that was known for not really leaving their ‘home waters,’ what the hell was he doing all the way out here, close to shore? Alone?

“Yes. He correctly names all the major pods and families. The correct ningyo names at that.” Kuroko reiterated, looking to the water out ahead of them, contemplative. “His information, it’s.” he began before abruptly stopping, which wasn’t something Kuroko ever did _at all._ He was hesitant to share something.

Taiga’s head jerked up from his phone. “It’s what?” he prompted. 

“Well, it’s almost as though it’s insider information. Like your father spoke to one of us to get it. A ningyo.” Kuroko explicitly stated, as if to make sure that there wouldn’t be any doubts as to what he was implying.

Taiga frowned, wondering not for the first time what type of life his father had led. All without his son’s knowing, to boot. “You can camouflage,” Taiga instead started, seeking any sort of distraction from his strange companion. “...like a squid?”

Kuroko squinted his eyes at him ever so slightly. Taiga wondered if that was his version of a glare. “No, I am not ‘like a squid’. _That_ part is not a very accurate statement. It’s not camouflage. I’m just difficult to notice. Unless I draw attention to myself, that is.”

Looking at the merman, Taiga wondered how anyone would be able to do that; not notice him. Everything about Kuroko drew Taiga’s attention. From his looks to his voice…

“My kind, my family pod, we’re not known for our strength or any sort of impressive, flashy ability.” Kuroko continued, looking down at his hands with a blank look, webbed fingers fanned out as far as they could. “So over time, we’ve developed our own sort of defense mechanisms, if you will.”

“A family pod?” Taiga repeated back. “So there are other types? Of pods, I mean.”

Kuroko nodded deftly. “How many you belong to exactly differs from ningyo to ningyo. Primarily I belong to the Kuros, as they’re the family I was born into and whose traits I possess. Social pods are formed during a ningyo’s early adolescence stage. We leave the comfort of our family pods and form our own connections. Sort of like a coming of age tradition.”

Still a little blown away by the usually silent and aloof creature being so direct and chatty, Taiga eagerly continued on with his questioning. “You’re kicked out that young?”

“You’re expected to leave and are prepared for being on your own in advance. You can always go back home whenever you wish. In fact, you’re expected to at some point, usually to mate or settle down. Though primarily your social pod is your most prevalent circle, once you reach a certain age.”

If that was the case, then...

“Where’s your ‘social pod’ now?” Taiga asked.

Taiga couldn’t tell what it was - maybe hesitation - that seemed to cloud Kuroko momentarily before he surprisingly began to answer, “They’re—”

Though then, it took Taiga a moment to realize that Kuroko had not only _abruptly_ stopped again but that he did so because something had gripped him, staying his tongue; fear. Kuroko was looking out ahead of him, towards the expanse of blackened sea and shoreline ahead of them.

“What’s wrong?” Taiga impatiently inquired as soon as he realized.

“There’s...the ships.” Kuroko tried again, brows actually furrowed. “They’re moving inland.” he informed as he put a hand to his head, as if nursing a headache. “And there’s...there’s something strange.”

“What’s strange?” Taiga prompted once more, trying not to let his panic overtake him, especially when he didn’t exactly know what was going on.

Kuroko was actually starting to seem pained now, as though he actually did have an aching head. His shoulders were slumping too. Another webbed hand joined the other on his forehead, pushing back the wet strands of blue hair as they squeezed in an attempt to try and ease the pain. “A noise...It’s...I think it’s meant to mess with my navigation...”

Taiga didn’t even bother repeating back that last word to convey his confusion. “This isn’t making any sense… What kind of noise—” he began but didn’t even get to finish because then he heard it.

It was whiny, for lack of a better word. Shrill. As if an alarm in the distance was going off. It was more annoying than anything, but then again he didn’t have those weird webbed ears that Kuroko did. Maybe they enhanced his hearing and led to the noise being more exaggerated? But whatever the reason was didn’t really matter, because Kuroko was actually starting to look woozy now. Like he was about to collapse, right off the rock and into the water. He couldn’t sit up, Taiga soon realized, let alone swim out of the Sound into safety if the boats really were coming right this way. 

With probably worryingly little thought, Taiga found himself scooping a still-dazed Kuroko up off his rock and into his arms. The merman was surprisingly heavy - he looked so thin after all, but he recalled again that the tail was pretty meaty. Though the deadweight creature wasn’t unwieldy for Taiga by any means. 

With little strain, Taiga hurriedly trudged out of the shallows and down the beach. In no time at all, the door to the cottage was shut behind them.

 _Damn,_ was his brain’s eloquent comment as Taiga finally registered what he’d just done. He’d even left the rentals on the rocks outside.

**Author's Note:**

> This whole fic will be a prologue of sorts, so this story will mostly be about Seirin and how Kagami and Kuroko meet. If there's enough interest, I hope to have fics that explore the world more and introduce more characters + concepts. More chapters are on their way! I'm thinking this fic will be about 4-5 chapters, but no real idea yet. Chapter 2 is done and 3 is in progress.
> 
> Please review and let me know what you thought!


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